they have special requirements for dpw to mitigate the graffiti. because of that 48-hour turn around, dpw is going to paint it and we couldn't implement that invoice ing of that nature. supervisor scott weiner: in your experience so far has at&t been an abating within 48 hours? >> i would say that at&t is being challenged and the constituents would very much say that at&t is not abating graffiti within the time that it's expected. i have heard multiple multiple objections

where it takes months and sometimes not at all and many times i hear how dpw have to go out and an abate it. >> if you hear that it's taken months, what happens next? >> what we first do, we advise the property owner to again call 311 and let the operator know that it's not been abated and we have instructed at&t, hey, you need to go to these specific cabinets and they do. at the end of the hearing they do go and abate it and make sure the sticker is. that's after the fact that these object ors. supervisor scott weiner: it shouldn't take a hearing. it should be automatic. what i would say, i'm glad to hear that so dpw is working with

at&t. it seems to me which is the goal to get the graffiti off quickly. so if dpw then understanding that there are certain needs of these boxes in terms of the way it's removed; is dpw learning to do this? >> certainly. we are understanding what kind of cleaners are allowed to be placed on the cabinets so the paint is not compromised. supervisor scott weiner: how does it work? don't they leave a deposit? speaker: yes. they have a $23,000 bond with at&t and we'll probably invoice them similar to the way we invoice permits. >> it's drawn on the account?

>> yes. supervisor scott weiner: okay. in the end for members of the public, it doesn't matter who is removing it as long as it's being removed. a question and then i will turn it over to supervisor kim. what is the permit, we get loose -- a lot of questions about at&t is putting boxes in the road of way and they should be paying for that. i understand there is a permit fee and revenue from each box understate law for use of the public right-of-way. >> there are two fees. there is a dpw permit fee. at&t pays for a technical review. then again pays dpw again if there is a hearing and at&t pays another

fee if the permit is ultimately approved. that's the dpw permitting process. as far as the franchising fee, that's up to the controllers and revenue that at&t obtains in csf. we have figures for that for the past year. supervisor scott weiner: i'm sure at&t can address this when they speak. i heard it's about 5 percent of the revenue from the box. i'm sure it will be addressed. in terms of the permit, in terms of permitting fees that at&t pays for these boxes, what are they? you compare it to -- >> i have the figures. let me take a look real quick. it's $75 to review the permit and another $75 if it goes to another hearing. i believe is $225 if it's approved. it

could total up to $400 with the final approved permit. supervisor scott weiner: okay. thank you, finally, you indicated to me about 2000 objections by neighbors or people across the city? >> yes. in 2013. correct. supervisor scott weiner: what percentage of the total objections to permits? >> what percentage have been approved? supervisor scott weiner: no, looking at all objections that have been approved, how many over all objections does the agency receive in a year? >> i would say close to, okay, if it's for 2013 we received about 2,000 objections. they roughly run about 2,000

objections. supervisor scott weiner: great. supervisor kim and supervisor cohen. supervisor jane kim: my questions are more directed to at&t. i would hold off with my questions. supervisor malia cohen: i have a question. what other companies also share space? >> puc they have monitoring equipment for water and mta has traffic control boxes and i think that's it at this point. supervisor malia cohen: for the commercial boxes do they also receive an equal number of complaints? >> for the ones that i received, no. let's say for example for pg & e they tried to place an equipment size on grand view and due to the fact that pg & e spent a lot of time

on this and originally we thought it would because of that area, we received one and even that one we were able to work it out because pg & e gave the flexibility in terms of the siting. depends on the amount of the interaction. supervisor malia cohen: you mentioned interaction, you and your staff meet with the constituents who have the concern about the cabinets on the public right-of-way, do you have interactions with at&t? are you interacting with their lawyers or staff members. describe handout you -- how that has been? are they respectful? >> sure. they have been phenomenal. there are responses. when we have technical questions, they never fail to provide us the answers in a clear consistent manner.

as far as at&t lawyers, you know, we are just -- we talk to them the way we are talking to all lawyers with all the surface mounted facilities and i don't believe there is any avenue where they are not being respectful or committed to trying to get to a resolution with dpw. supervisor malia cohen: okay. i was wondering if there are any rules in place to prevent installations of these utility boxes in historic districts? >> yes. there is in the dpw guidelines i have them here. i can quickly mention it to you. actually i left it on my chair. in historic districts, any type of applicants are not loud to place surface mounted cabinets

in areas in the conservation district next to landmarks. there is quite a list. so i can read it off to you. they shall not be placed in districts designated in the sf planning code. they can not be placed in california registered historic districts and national historic districts and not in a park or historic places and national landmarks given the fact that they are cited with the planning department. supervisor malia cohen: do you know of any utility boxes placed in the locations of district that you have described in that list? >> not to my knowledge. supervisor malia cohen: okay. thank you, mr. chair. supervisor scott weiner: are you going to be talking about

the process for objecting? >> yes. it's in here. do you want me to continue on? supervisor scott weiner: yes. continue on and i just want to make sure because there have been questions about noticing and who gets notified and i want to make sure you talk about that. you can go e back to your presentation. >> you can prompt me too. we are on the timeline. do you want me to go over the timeline? it's history about how at&t has deployed the cabinets. i'm not sure if that's something you are interested in. since 2006, at&t has been seeking excavation permits and as you spoke to as going to the courts and there was an appeal and currently it's still going to the courts.

due to the fact that judge denied the petition in categorical exemption in at&t project, we are continuing on with issuing excavation permits. so i don't know if you have any other questions with regards to that. okay. so let's go on to the keypoints. you also mentioned the mou agreement. we have an agreement with mou agreement. there will be an annual meeting with the public works. it includes additional noticing for each cabinet providing a website for the general public to obtain information. a commitment to hire local work force, paid cost for permitting process and pay the cost of cabinet relocations. we went over the review process

already. just so you know we want to make sure the cabinets are placed in the furniture zone. they are situated away from fire hydrants and blue zones. we don't have to go into that in detail. they can't be placed next to public arts. the arts commission gets involved anytime there is public art. we definitely avoid those areas. supervisor scott weiner: in terms of the criteria, dpw uses, i know that we got the planning department involved to work collaboratively with dpw to ensure compliance with the better streets plan. can you talk about how that's working? >> okay. so recently as you know, dpw and the planning department have been working collaboratively to try to add a couple of better street plan

components where appropriate into any of these permits as well as trying to mitigate or offset the aesthetics of the cabinets. that's been going well. we've been working collaboratively with planning. planning has come up with menus that we can propose with each site and we'll begin to issue permitting for these sites hopefully this week. supervisor scott weiner: what kind of changes. i know there has been some talk about greening, although i know there are some folks who they don't want -- because they think they are going to have to take care of it because at&t once they plant it doesn't have to take care of it. >> yeah, i think the big challenge is what this program is considering. in the past before this program was brought to in the fall, at&t was

working to identify areas where if the property owner would requested it to work with department of public works for a tree. the one thing that is able to install it is the property owner is on the maintenance. that maintenance can be a huge problem for property owners to maintain it and water it and upkeep. due to that, i think to my knowledge there has been one landscaping that has occurred during this entire process. supervisor scott weiner: i don't want to get into broader discussion on street trees short of smiling that we have an absolutely horrible and unfair system that we require property owners to be legally and otherwise responsible for street trees even if they don't

want it or can't afford to take care of it. to me it's not surprised to say, we are putting this utility box out here that is big and ugly and we are going to make it better by having greening. so we are going to put it out there and guess what, you are on the hook for taking care of it and if anyone trips on it you are legal le responsible. that's not shocking that people wouldn't be too keen on that. i understand that at&t doesn't want to go on the management of that but if you are general rating a box on the runway, i don't think it's unreasonable to say that you ought to be maintaining around the box. i'm going to register yet again my continuing objection to voicing this kind of responsibility on

the property owners when it's just not fair and it's not good public policy. another issue has to do with putting art on the boxes and i have had several discussions with at&t about several frank discussions with at&t about this and there are some different perspectives on it because i have had constituents who have said we don't love these boxes for them not to be there but if you are going to put it there, can you at least do some sort of artwork on it so it's attractive looking. in fact there was an mta traffic control box on church that had a local artist work on it and when mta had temporarily removed the box because the equipment failed and they had to replace it. they removed the box and there was this mass anxiety in the neighborhood. everybody wanted the box back

because the art was so beautiful. there is one of those things if you have a bitter pill at least in improving that, i know at&t and i will ask about this when they present. to me it seems so logical to say whether it's a traffic control box or puc box or at&t box or any of these boxes, it makes sense to offer as an opportunity to put artwork on it. it's good for the community to have that kind of art, it's good for artist for letting them to show their art and frustrating for me and a lot of people that it doesn't happen. it seems like a way to solve the problem. so i want to put that out there that i think that should be a requirement. >> yeah. you know we have gone and looked at other cities to

look at mitigation measures and other cities have been very, they have made them into benches. they have made them into fake trees. but i agree with you that there are so many ways because we have heard so many objections about these. supervisor scott weiner: has dpw pushed at&t. i know they have issues about warrant and with the manufacturer but there may be ways to workup the change. >> we have definitely worked with at&t and encouraged that but also mindful of the dpw guidelines and what measures we should -- enforce onto the applicant. supervisor scott weiner: also we work with the department of public works director to issue the surface mounted utility order which is an administrator regulation and we are working

to codify the surface mounting utility and to update it and to address some of these issues. these kinds of issues are all sort of on the on going list. so, great. you can go ahead. >> okay. so you wanted to go over the noticing process. that's the next page. what you would see is the standard notice that at&t places when ever they have a proposed site. they place it in visible locations as well the proposed site. this is the information required in the dpw guidelines. in addition to that for the mou at&t is also, this is beyond the guidelines, also mails it to property owners and residents who live within 150 feet of this proposed location. this is what it looks like and

this is the information it contains. it gives you the overview of what the cabinet is supposed to do and if you want to submit an objection within the 20-day period which is a requirement then you can place it with dpw. so the next page is the hearing process. it's posted by at&t and the object or has 20 days to object to dpw. they can do it through e-mail or they can mail it to us or fax it in. we respond to every single objection. >> so after that, when dpw will schedule a hearing when we receive an objection whether it's one or 100, we notify the objector 15 days in advance. the hearing officer will make a

decision and the director will either adopt ora prove or disapprove the determination and we issue a final determination. the common concerns as you see on the powerpoint, the common concerns listed will be ada path of travel, there are too many cabinets in the neighborhood, it devalues property, they are not to scale which is an issue because people when they see the notice posted in the area they don't quite understand the actual significance or size of the cabinet. graffiti is the no. 1 complaint we receive at all hearings. screenings and hearings, they don't understand the property owner would be maintaining the greening. access to vehicles, impact on

aesthetic character, translation issues, residential structures. they would like it only in commercial areas and the trash left behind these existing cabinets are a big issue. so the next pages are just to go over the issues that are brought up at hearings. the main one of course is graffiti or the lack of abatement in a timely manner. the next page, there is more graffiti. more graffiti. here is another one ballard's place. the foot print shown on the notice. it's on the cabinet. it extends out to 11 feet. it can block an entire car. cabinets can create a wall especially if there is other street furniture. supervisor scott weiner: supervisor cohen? supervisor malia cohen: what's the purpose of the ballard? >> to protect it if it were to

jump the curb and just in general to protect it. there is sensitive electronic equipment inside. supervisor malia cohen: i don't know the difference between the cabinets? >> all these cabinets are at&t cabinets. >> do they usually put ballards around them? >> the new ones. another consistent concern is trash and blight. we are not sure why people tend to place their trash on cabinets but that's a real persistent issue. finally it looks well but i think there has been a lot of concern about the at&t technicians for thing forgetting to clean up after themselves. it's already difficult to property owners to

see the technicians leave. >> what is that? >> that is just wiring left behind. finally in summation, at&t would like to place a total of 126. i think that has gone down to locations and combining boxers. we approved 185 sites to install and only disapproved 9. there is also 180 in construction and again, i mentioned to you that we received over 2,000 protest in 2013 alone. finally the last page is where at&t has an approved permit at this point. it's around 180 plus. i'm here to answer any other questions you might have.

supervisor scott weiner: in terms of the -- supervisor cohen do you have a question? okay. in terms of the hearing process at dpw, so people get notification. what's your experience been in terms of feedback from neighbors saying i got notice, i didn't get notice? >> there are concerns about proper noticing. either we are told they haven't received a notice or the notice that at&t did provide or the the feedback that they did get back was not adequate. for example, for all the 2000 objections we did receive, in many of the cases at&t response to those objections was to hold the box. at&t might not respond to that, but the response is to hold the box. they are held during the day during business hours and

sometimes the constituents or object ors do have trouble to attend. so they are not communicated to at&t. the next thing they hear is at the dpw hearing and there is a lot of concern. supervisor scott weiner: the next thing we hear is they get a notice to their address. let's say they do it here instead and some other people maybe not be very happy about that. i know it becomes a very challenging situation. if a new address is chosen, is there a new noticing that happens? >> it depends. sometimes, let's say we are at a hearing and there is an objection. let's bring up 121, we received 55 objections for that site. the community was able to work out an alternative site. the

hearing officer can keep the hearing open for 120 days to look at the alternative site. if it is kept over for 20 days, then the noticing is not so long and the noticing is for second set of days. that second set of folks that are impacted by that site don't get the same view process in terms of the length of the notice being kept out and it won't have the same due process because we are not having a second hearing. supervisor scott weiner: what if you were not within the notice radius of the first location, but you are for the second, why wouldn't you been -- entitleed to the same due process? >> that's where we can address these due processes that should be given to everyone. >> we will address that. i

would given that the smf orders that there are modifications in place as we go through legislative process which is never fast. so i would encourage you to do that. i think it's important for people to get notice even if it means renoticing. >> that's a really good point and we have taken it back. instead of keeping you open for 20 days. if there is an alternate site instead what we suggest to do is to go through process again for the second site and there is a second set of community object ors. >> i know people have expressed that there is no point of

objecting or requesting a hearing because they think it's a done deal. recently i saw one particular box in district 8 where the director of public works had a box and the director an appealed to it. and putting aside the merits of that dispute, i was heart end to see it because it shows the department was not just granting every application. i think it's important for people to understand that it is worth participating in the process and that nothing is a done deal. can you just comment on that? >> so, yes, i would like to comment on that. what dpw does is implement the guidelines. the guidelines are clear in terms of what the hearing officer is allowed to recommend for disapproval or approval. we are confined to these guidelines and one of the

guidelines say that, yes, we need to find something that is least impactful to the community. that's why you see some disapproved sites. for the majority of them, if there is no alternate site for the community, we don't really entertain that alternate site and we do approve that location because there is no alternate site. at&t is loud to place the cabinets in the public right-of-way. did i answer that question? >> i think so but there are situations where the department. >> there is 9 sites that we disapproved at this point. cohen supervisor malia cohen: thank you very much. at this time i would like to bring up john